{"id":7027,"date":"2012-12-13T13:47:49","date_gmt":"2012-12-13T20:47:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=7027"},"modified":"2012-12-18T07:09:17","modified_gmt":"2012-12-18T14:09:17","slug":"thats-better","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/?p=7027","title":{"rendered":"Pick Me Up."},"content":{"rendered":"

Well, things\u00a0went from bad to worse.<\/p>\n

The hose sprung a leak after constantly being unattached and reattached to the water hydrant due to freezing temperatures at night.\u00a0 So a lovely mud slick developed outside the barn door.<\/p>\n

One of the ducks turned up injured.\u00a0 Possibly broken leg.\u00a0 She can move around, but slowly.\u00a0 And kind of floppingly.\u00a0 Of course not floppingly enough to be an easy capture.\u00a0 Her wings still work and\u00a0she’ll fly\u00a0right down to the pond when we attempt to take her into protective custody.\u00a0 So the best we can do\u00a0is guard her\u00a0each day during the morning madness at the chicken trough, chasing others out of her space to ensure she gets a sufficient amount of food.<\/p>\n

Isaac, one of the\u00a0sheep,\u00a0broke off a horn.\u00a0 We have no idea how.\u00a0 We wanted to examine it to figure out what happened and check for infection.\u00a0 But we settled for spraying it with Blu-Kote from a distance, which was all he would tolerate.\u00a0 He ended up with almost that entire side of his face blue, kind of like a Braveheart in the barn yard.\u00a0 Plus I had to go to work with blue fingers for the next 3 days.<\/p>\n

Riccio developed another sebaceous cyst and we had to drain it and sprinkle it with wound powder.\u00a0 These cysts are common in guinea pigs, don’t\u00a0seem to be painful,\u00a0and can be cleaned up pretty well whenever\u00a0you find him sitting in his cage oozing pus on everything.\u00a0 Draining them does require a strong stomach\u00a0or apparently some kind of sick proclivity like those people that constantly post videos of bursting sores, boils, blisters, pimples\u00a0and other disgusting growths on YouTube.\u00a0 Perhaps someone needs to buy them a guinea pig.<\/p>\n

We are getting slews of Christmas cards every day in the mailbox.\u00a0 Which just reminds me that we have yet to make and order any cards yet.\u00a0 And what are the odds of that happening at this point?<\/p>\n

Which also reminds me that we have failed to get out the Christmas decorations or put up a Christmas tree.\u00a0\u00a0 Getting out the decorations means braving the disorganized mess in the shed.\u00a0 In addition to\u00a0putting “clean out the shed” back on the To Do list.\u00a0 Where it will sit until summer arrives and\u00a0I take it off the list\u00a0because no one cleans out the shed during snake and spider season.\u00a0 And then I will ignore it until I need to get out the Christmas decorations next year.\u00a0 It’s an exhausting and\u00a0dysfunctional cycle.<\/p>\n

Should I even bother to mention that it rained throughout the entire Christmas parade—-leaving us soaked and dispirited on the sidewalk and with a mountain of wet blankets to wash afterwards?<\/p>\n

Then there’s the fact that the little ones’ last day of school is tomorrow.\u00a0 They will be out for 3 weeks and bored after 3 days.\u00a0 So, at some point, I need to start planning activities, crafts, and outings\u00a0to keep them off the\u00a0iPad\u00a0and away from the television.\u00a0 Perhaps they would enjoy clipping the stacks of coupons piled on the counter or cleaning the leaves out of the gutters.<\/p>\n

All of this was complicated by the fact that the laptop broke and only turns on about once every 1,000,000 tries.\u00a0 All the usual\u00a0tricks like taking off the battery or\u00a0making it sit\u00a0on an angle are beginning to fail.\u00a0 Too bad the real computer broke 2 years ago and is still sitting, dusty and impotent, in the office, waiting for someone to come up\u00a0with $500 to fix its hard drive.\u00a0 Now The Other Half and\u00a0I are\u00a0forced to address questions like:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 Is it cheaper to fix the computer or the laptop?<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0\u00a0Should we even bother to\u00a0fix the laptop or just replace it with another laptop?<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 Do we need to buy replacement software or risk using open source software that may not be compatible with work or school requirements?<\/p>\n

4.\u00a0 Do we trust the repair departments at big\u00a0electronic stores or should we try using tech friends who fix\u00a0electronics on the side?<\/p>\n

These are diffcult questions for people like us.\u00a0 We have a television where the bottom part of the\u00a0picture is always cut off because we don’t know how to switch the display from\u00a0regular to full screen.\u00a0 Any part of a program or movie\u00a0with subtitles is completely lost on us.\u00a0 We have had a stereo sitting on the\u00a0entertainment center\u00a0for over\u00a0a year that we cannot play because we don’t know how to hook up the speakers.\u00a0 We just settle for plugging in one of the kids’ portable radio\/CD players on the kitchen counter when we want to hear music downstairs.\u00a0 We just don’t do electronics.\u00a0 Of any kind.<\/p>\n

So the kids have repeatedly come home from school to find me laying curled up in blankets\u00a0on the couch, wrapped in my latest scarf, too cold to move.\u00a0 Because the wood stove hasn’t worked since the chimney fire.<\/p>\n

Oh, sure, I made meals and dragged myself through the housecleaning.\u00a0 I made it to Ultimate Frisbee games and basketball practice.\u00a0 But anyone\u00a0could see\u00a0that I\u00a0was missing\u00a0my usual pizazz.<\/p>\n

“I think\u00a0I could\u00a0have seasonal affective disorder<\/em>,” I mentioned when one of the kids asked if I was feeling sick.<\/p>\n

They looked confused.<\/p>\n

“It was sunny and 70 degrees all last week,” they pointed out.<\/p>\n

“Right, but that was last week!\u00a0 It’s been gloomy and rainy for 4 days<\/em>!”<\/p>\n

“I thought you said you wanted rain in order for the grass seed to take hold, ” they countered.<\/p>\n

Really.\u00a0 Can no one just empathize?<\/p>\n

Obviously I had to take things into my own hands.\u00a0 I considered getting a pedicure but my last one didn’t have any chips yet.\u00a0 A\u00a0massage would have been wonderful but\u00a0I can only afford that once every 3 months and I had\u00a0a\u00a0hot\u00a0towels and\u00a0aromatherapy\u00a0massage\u00a0in November.\u00a0 I slept through $5 movie day at the local theatre.<\/p>\n

Things were truly desperate.<\/p>\n

Thank goodness, in a stroke of amazing luck, the laptop finally booted up!\u00a0 So after checking and jotting down the kids’ sports practice and game schedules;\u00a0perusing emails about Christmas choir, field trips, and continuing education assignments; and printing off some Highlights hidden pictures and word searches for the boys, I did what any reasonable farmer would do.<\/p>\n

I went straight to Craigslist.\u00a0 I looked under the farm & garden section.\u00a0 I searched for chickens.\u00a0 And wouldn’t you know it?\u00a0 Someone was looking to unload some 3 week old Silkie chicks at $5\/each.\u00a0 Jackpot!<\/p>\n

We made arrangements to meet up, I set up the brooder room while humming my favorite Christmas carols, and the next day I came home with\u00a0my box full of sunshine. 6 adorable Silkie chicks, including a partridge and a couple splashes.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Aaah.\u00a0 That’s better.\u00a0 The perfect pick me up that I needed to get through these doldrums.<\/p>\n

It can’t feel like winter when it’s spring in the brooder room!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Well, things\u00a0went from bad to worse. The hose sprung a leak after constantly being unattached and reattached to the water hydrant due to freezing temperatures at night.\u00a0 So a lovely mud slick developed outside the barn door. One of the ducks turned up injured.\u00a0 Possibly broken leg.\u00a0 She can move around, but slowly.\u00a0 And kind […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7027","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7027","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7027"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7027\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7053,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7027\/revisions\/7053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7027"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7027"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7027"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}